A brief thought on art and culture

(This was supposed to be the basis for a poem, but out of laziness, I decided to just write it out as a rant.)

One idea that has been occupying my thoughts lately is how bizarre it is that arts can be seen as embodying culture. For example, when someone says that Katy Perry's music reflects some large segment of American culture, or that a community should do more to publicly fund the arts in order to "promote culture."

The reason that this strikes me as so odd is that, in most cases, nothing is more private and individualistic than art and the process by which it comes into being. Every step of the way, from developing one's style to determining subject matter to execution, is a display of individualism. And so at best, it seems to me that collective culture, as far as the arts are involved, is really a constellation of different, radical individualisms.

Or... if we say that American culture, for example, is defined, in large part, by diversity, then no particular works of art or music or dance could be called representative of it. It would be defined by the available spectrum, so to speak, not the individual works... which is a roundabout way of saying that there are no creators of culture, only contributors.